Oakley sunglasses on Chilean Miners worth $41 Million in exposure

Okay, bad choice of phrase, if you missed it, yesterday was the day all 33 Chilean miners were rescued after spending 69 days underground. The whole operation was streamed live on TV, and on CNN.com, as each one of the 33 miners were brought up in what looked like a little rocket elevator. All miners were wearing sunglasses as they came up, as their eyes were accustomed to the dark, and these sunglasses were donated by Oakley.
The glasses retail at $$180, and 35 were donated to the effort, so $6300 was invested in what is projected to be worth $41 million in advertising time, as the images of the miners coming up is on practically every channel, worldwide.

In worldwide television impact alone, Oakley garnered $41 million in equivalent advertising time, according to research done for CNBC from Front Row Analytics, a sponsorship evaluation firm.
Eric Smallwood, vice president of project management for the company, told CNBC that the company took into account the live coverage, the recaps and a rough estimate of the audience watching around the world.
Smallwood said the company also took into account that company gets more exposure at night, when there are more people watching and the Oakley “O” comes out more clear.
Front Row broke the exposure down by country. Oakley will get the most exposure in China ($11.7 million), $6.4 million in the United States, $898,000 in the United Kingdom and $703,000 in Chile.
“It’s a goodwill gesture that will turn into mass amounts of exposure for Oakley in a positive manner,” Smallwood said.
Oakley’s best exposure so far has been from “Super” Mario Sepulveda Espina, the second miner who came out whose fired up attitude has been replayed over and over again throughout the world.
The subject became a hot topic on Twitter. One person (@highlow) asks “Oakley is using the Chilean mine rescue as a marketing opportunity—poor taste or philanthropic move? Another (@idaspeeda) called it “the product placement of the year.”